Calacas
Calacas Listen to me, cabron. I know what you did. I know where the bodies are buried, and I know what they’d do to you if they found out. By the way, your wife says hello. On el Día de los Muertos in Mexico City in 1902, a chapter house of the Ordo Dracul embarked on a bizarre experiment in an attempt to understand the Day of the Dead and its occult origins. The Mexico City Dragons had a theory that, to a limited extent, the laws of life and death worked backwards during the Day of the Dead. They held that the shades of the dead did not want to return to the world of the living, but that some compelling force drew them back from the Underworld just as surely as it normally drew the souls of the deceased to their eternal rest. The Dragons further hypothesized that, just as some souls were able to resist that force by remaining on the earthly plane after death, some souls might also be able to resist the spiritual “low tide” and remain in the afterlife through the Day of the Dead. By studying both those ghosts who remained in the material realm and those who clung to the Underworld, the Dragons thought to achieve a greater understanding of the forces that anchored the Kindred soul in its state of perpetual stasis. The Dragons gathered in their chapter house shortly before midnight on November 2, 1902. There were five researchers present to catalog the results of the experiment, which was to be conducted principally by Hector Luíz Guerrera, a Nosferatu elder who had been a medium in his breathing days, and another whose identity was never recorded — popular theory holds that this other was a mortal necromancer. At precisely midnight, when tradition dictated that the souls of the departed began to return to the world, Guerrera and his associate conducted a ritual that was supposed to conjure a ghost from the Underworld, which would be channeled into Guerrera and use the Nosferatu as a mouthpiece. The ritual appeared to work, but the ghost’s strength of will proved stronger than the Dragons had expected. Guerrera, apparently under the ghost’s control, killed his associate and three of the researchers, then fled the chapter house. The surviving Dragons reported that Guerrera’s previously unremarkable face had been transformed into the likeness of a skull, giving him the appearance of a living calaca mask. Hector Guerrera disappeared from Kindred society after that unfortunate event, and popular consensus was that the possessing ghost, not realizing its new body was that of a vampire, did not seek shelter from the sun and was killed a second time the next dawn. Then, in 1928, a Kindred with a face like a calaca mask presented herself at the Mexico City chapter house of the Ordo Dracul. She claimed to be the childe of Hector Luíz Guerrera, and said that her sire had mastered the ghost that possessed him and learned much about the “tidal forces of life and death.” His childe, Rosa, had been sent to guarantee that no retribution would come upon Guerrera for the deaths of the three Dragons more than a quarter of a century before. Rosa was assured that Guerrera would be welcomed back with open arms, as long as he would share his insights with the order. On el Día de los Muertos in 1928, Hector himself returned to Mexico City, bringing with him a brood of eight childer, each with the same skull-like face as their sire. True to Guerrera’s word, the Calacas bloodline brought with it a new understanding of the strange forces of life and death that caused el Día de los Muertos. Guerrera and most of his childer still dwell in Mexico City, continuing their studies of ghosts and the Underworld. Thanks largely to the Calacas, the Dragons of Mexico City are acknowledged some of the leading experts on the subjects in all Mexico. Parent Clan: Nosferatu Nickname: Sugar-Skulls Covenant Most Calacas belong to the Ordo Dracul. In fact, the bulk of Calacas in modern nights have no direct blood lineage with Hector Luíz Guerrera at all, having been inducted instead by Guerrera or one of his childer acting as Avus. Those Calacas who leave the order usually remain Unbound, but some have been known to fall in with the Circle of the Crone. Less mystically inclined Calacas tend to favor the Carthian Movement over the Invictus. To date, there has been no verifiable record of a Calaca joining the Lancea Sanctum, but that is likely due more to the Ordo Dracul’s prejudice against the Sanctified being fed to fledgling Calacas rather than any specific disinclination toward the teachings of Longinus. Appearance Most Calacas are of Mexican heritage, but they range across the spectrum from almost-pure Spanish blood to 100% Zapotec. They tend to dress in reserved, subdued clothing befitting an academic, though some young Calacas deliberately take an opposite tack, dressing in brightly colored, elaborately decorated traditional dress, making themselves look like the calaca decorations mortals put up for el Día de los Muertos. As part of assuming the Calaca bloodline, all members’ faces become exceptionally pale and distorted, with small eyes sunken in deep sockets, vestigial noses and thin lips that show the prominent outlines of their teeth. Their appearance is not blatantly supernatural, and most humans who see them assume that they suffer from some deformity or birth defect, but a Calaca’s bizarre appearance will certainly draw attention. Haven Most of the Calacas in Mexico City lair at the Ordo Dracul’s chapter house in that city rather than maintaining havens of their own. Those who do maintain havens, or members traveling abroad, often claim cemeteries or old, abandoned mortuaries as havens. Others prefer the traditional Nosferatu standby and lair in the sewers or storm tunnels. Background When a Calaca Embraces, she almost always chooses a mortal with some sort of psychic affinity for ghosts. Whether this is simply out of respect for their founder or because mediums have some ineffable quality that survives the Embrace and makes the bloodline’s studies of the afterlife easier has never been revealed outside the bloodline. Naturally, as members of the Ordo Dracul, Calacas also look for a keen intelligence and a desire to question and ultimately understand the world around them. Currently, however, the bulk of the Calacas bloodline comprises ancillae and, rarely, particularly gifted neonates who were not Embraced into the bloodline, but who have spent years studying ghosts and mapping Haunts and have advanced the order’s understanding of these subjects sufficiently to impress Hector Guerrera, or one of his childer. These notable scholars are offered membership in the bloodline, with one of Guerrera’s original childer (or, in rare cases, Guerrera himself) serving as the prospective member’s Avus. Some Nosferatu have traveled from as far as Yucatán or even the United States to receive this honor. Character Creation Most Calacas are of a scholarly bent, and not terribly well adapted in social situations (unsurprising, given their parentage). Ghosts don’t always congregate in easily accessed public places, and Calacas must sometimes investigate crumbling Aztec ruins or hazardous mountain passes to conduct their research; as such, Mental Attributes tend to be primary, with Physical secondary and Social lagging behind. Likewise, Calacas tend to focus on Mental Skills and Merits, with Occult and Eidetic Memory being the most common, respectively. Physical Skills are useful for exploration and self-defense, but many Calacas prefer to make Social Skills their secondary category in order to have a broader palette to draw from when dealing with recalcitrant ghosts. Buying a second dot of Blood Potency is a good idea, or else the character is just a Nosferatu applicant hoping to be chosen for the bloodline. Bloodline Disciplines Auspex , Nightmare , Obfuscate , Vigor Weakness Furthermore, the Calacas’ frequent close proximity to ghosts and haunted Dragon’s Nests (and, if rumor is to be believed, the unique circumstances of the bloodline’s creation) means that ghostly phenomena are drawn to these vampires like iron filings to a magnet. This typically manifests as random cold spots, ethereal breezes or faint, barely audible whispers around the character. This effect is deeply unnerving, even to those accustomed to it, and seems to get worse as the Calaca’s Humanity erodes. For this reason, Humanity acts as a cap on all the Calacas’ dice pools for social interaction (not including Intimidation or rolls to activate Nightmare powers), not just when they interact with mortals Organization The Calacas are still a fairly small bloodline, and though they are mostly centrally located, they are surprisingly loosely organized. Individual members are free to pursue whatever line of research they feel is relevant, as long as they share their findings with the rest of the bloodline and, ostensibly, the Ordo Dracul (in reality, Hector Guerrera decides which of the bloodline’s findings are passed on to the order at large). If a member’s work is considered frivolous, dangerous or otherwise detrimental, a simple majority vote of Guerrera’s childer can proscribe a Kindred from continuing. Guerrera himself can veto his childer on these votes, and occasionally does so. Character Concepts Ghost hunter, Kindred medium, leyline mapper, Ordo Dracul troubleshooter, Underworld obsessed researcher. Devotions Many of the Devotions Ava has created cause the Sugar Skull's blood to become a black ectoplasm material. Some say the Calacas's blood is drawing from material directly from the underworld. Insight in the Veil prerequisites: Auspex 1, Vigor 1 You are able to push your senses past the normal physical world. Cost: 1 Vitae Dice Pool: Wits + Investigation + Auspex Action: Reflexive Roll Results Dramatic Failure: your vision becomes clouded, like you’re looking in a thick fog bank. all vision checks are at a -3 for 6-your auspex in turns. Failure: you see normally Success: You are able to see into the Twilight. Ghosts, even other denizens in the area that are in the haze of the Twilight realm become visible to you. This is lasts for turns equal to successes. Exceptional Success: You are able to maintain your vision for the entire scene. (Note, this is not looking across the Gauntlet into the Shadow Realm, this is just seeing into Twilight.) This costs one experience Cache Fetter prerequisites: Auspex 3, Obfuscate 2 This power of Ava’s was developed to hide fetters from ghosts themselves, whether to smuggle the fetter away from the dead soul or simply to put it somewhere without the ghost knowing where it is. Each Vitae that is used turns a dark grey, almost black, like the color of tarnished lead. The ichor coats the object in question, if the fetter is alive they must make a Resolve + Composure roll penalized by the user’s blood potency or become panicked. If the living fetter is asleep and they are able to make a perception check they can to notice they are being coated in a substance. the ichor coating the person or animal does not interfere with their breathing or other functions acting as a permeable membrane, however vision is obscured. For some reason this power can only be done to someone that is a fetter for a ghost. If used on someone that is not a fetter the Vitae simply leaks out into Twilight, with seemingly no effect. Cost: 1 Vitae per size of the object being hidden up to size 5. Vitae must be spent prior to the roll. Dice Pool: Manipulation + Larceny + Obfuscate - Resistance of the Ghost to whom the fetter belongs, whether the ghost is present or not . Action: Instant Roll Results Dramatic Failure: not only does the power not work, the ghost is made acutely aware of the power being used. If the ghost is not in proximity of the fetter, than can move to it as normal. Failure: The vitae is spent but nothing happens. Success: The ghost loses connection with the object. This can force a ghost to move to another fetter of theirs while the power is in effect. The power lasts for one hour per success, the user knows how long they have. Exceptional Success: the power lasts until sunrise. This power costs 3 experience The Black Key prerequisites: Auspex 2, Vigor 2 description: This is the Calacas’s power to open existing gateways to the Underworld. They must know the doorway is there and often that’s the difficult part, then they simply force their way through. Cost: 2 Vitae Dice Pool: Strength + Occult + Auspex (Vigor bonuses apply) Action: Instant Roll Results Dramatic Failure: The doorway seals shut and can not be opened until after the next sunset Failure: the doorway does not open but can be tried again. Success: the doorway opens to where it normally goes. Exceptional Success: as the doorway opens, the user gets a glimpse of what’s on the other side. The user, and only the user, effectively has a surprise round while they travel through to that side. This power is known of by the Khaibit, and coveted by many of them. This power costs 2 experience. Wraithly cowl prerequisites: Nightmare 2, Obfuscate 2 you make your dead flesh even more dead, looking more rotten and skeletal than other Calacas. But this aids in ghosts thinking you are just one of them. Cost: none or 1 vitae Dice Pool: Manipulation + Subterfuge + Nightmare Action: Instant, or reflexive for 1 Vitae Roll Results Dramatic Failure: you manage to make yourself seem like a beacon of life, or like a hated enemy of the ghosts in your vicinity. Failure: nothing happens Success: You appear even more dead and decaying than most Calacas, accentuating your dead flesh to disturbing degrees, ghosts will simply see you as one of their fellow dead. Your gain +2 on social rolls with ghosts and other intelligent dead (vampires are undead). In addition you gain +2 on intimidation versus mortals. It lasts for one hour per success. Exceptional Success: the bonus is increased to a +3, and lasts until the next sunrise The Black Door prerequisites: Obfuscate 5 and Nightmare 5 The user is able to rip a hole to the top layers of the underworld. In order to do this they must be in a spiritually weak place, it must have some resonance with the dead. It might be a cemetery, an old rotting, unused building, a back alley where a murder has happened, etc. It doesn’t have to be a full blown loci, but it will be a place that has influence that way. This may take a bit of investigation to find an appropriate place. The user must drip blood on an existing door, it could be a mausoleum door, an old shed in the area, even a locked and forgotten door in the alley will work. Often more blood will be needed than one user is able to hold, so other vessels may have to be brought. Cost: 3 blood per draw Dice Pool: Intelligence + Occult + Nightmare - the gauntlet rating of the area Action: Instant and Extended 20 successes are needed Roll Results Dramatic Failure: the Gate does not extend to the Underworld, it extends to the Shadow realm (the Hisil) where there are probably many hungry blood spirits that have gathered at the energies there. Failure: no advancement is made on the power Success: accumulated successes go toward the needed goal. Exceptional Success: significant progress is made, in fact the gauntlet rating is considered one lower for purposes of this power, until it is complete. Once the 20 successes are achieved the doorway can then be used to travel to the topmost realms of the Underworld. Once this power is used the gateway an only be opened at night and must be opened with the power The Black Key, but there are rumors that other supernatural creatures have different methods to open the Door… This power costs 5 experience